Greeks Bearing Gifts

by Philip Kerr

  I hadn’t ever met Walther Neff, but his sudden disappearance made me uneasy, as if somehow it might be connected with what had happened in Athens.

  “As a matter of interest, which hospital was he in?”

  “The Schwabing. Same as Buchholz.”

  “What does his wife have to say about it?”

  “Not much. She seems as puzzled as the rest of us. Listen, take care of yourself. And let me know if there’s anything else you need.”

  I started to say something else only there was a click and Dietrich had disappeared. But that wasn’t strange at all.

  TWENTY-NINE

  –

  “Did you know Walther Neff well?”

  “He came to Greece on a number of occasions, sir,” said Garlopis.

  “That doesn’t answer my question.”

  “I knew him well enough. Better than he was aware of, perhaps.”

  “What was your opinion of him?”

  Garlopis looked awkward. He opened his desk drawer and closed it again, for no apparent reason. It was the morning after my conversation with Dietrich and I was in the MRE office with Garlopis.

  “You can speak freely. I’ve hardly ever met the man, so I don’t care if your opinion is good or bad. I just want to know what it is.”

  “I don’t think he liked Greeks very much. Or anyone else for that matter. Anyone else who wasn’t German.”

  “You mean he was still a bit of a Nazi.”

  “I think that about covers it, sir. Once or twice he made a casual remark about the Jews and how they’d brought their own misfortunes on themselves. And once he came across an old copy of Time magazine that had a picture of David Ben-Gurion on the cover, and his face was a study of loathing. I’d never seen hate that was so visceral. But why do you ask?”

  “He’s disappeared from the hospital in Munich. Checked himself out and then just walked into the darkness, so to speak. The cops are looking for him. But—well, I don’t think they’ll find him. I’m afraid this sort of thing happens a lot in Germany.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Because someone’s ghost recognizes someone else from the war. Millions of people died, but people forget that plenty of people survived, too. Thirty thousand people came out of Dachau. Thirty thousand witnesses to mass murder. But there are probably just as many people in Germany right now who are not who they say they are.”

  “You mean they’re living under a false name? Because of something they did during the war?”

  “Exactly. My guess is that Walther Neff had a secret history like so many other of my countrymen. Maybe he was already living under a false name. And someone discovered this and threatened to do something about it. So Neff took off before it could cause him any more problems. These days that’s a very common story.”

  Was it possible that Neff had even faked his own heart attack after reading the article I’d written on the subject at Alzheimer’s request in the company newspaper?

  “But I thought Adenauer was pursuing a policy of amnesty and integration,” said Garlopis. “That many Nazi war criminals had been released. As many as thirty-five thousand people, wasn’t it? Why would anyone fear discovery now, after your government has called a halt to denazification?”

  “Lots of reasons. The amnesty only applies in Germany. It wouldn’t apply if a Nazi came here, for example. And of course some of the left-of-center newspapers can still make life difficult for old Nazis. Not everyone in Germany agrees with the Old Man’s policy. There’s that and there are the Israeli Defense Forces, of course. There’s no telling what they’re capable of. Five years ago the right-wing Herut Party tried to assassinate the Old Man. No, I imagine that sometimes it’s just best to adopt another name and disappear. Just like this fellow Alois Brunner that Lieutenant Leventis is after.”

  Garlopis was silent for a moment. Then he got up and closed the door to the outside office, where Telesilla was typing letters. “I don’t say that all Germans are bad,” he said. “Not a bit of it. As you know, my own father was a German after all.”

  “What happened to him anyway?”

  “He died a few years ago. He was eating breakfast at the time.”

  “I suppose you finished it for him.”

  Garlopis winced.

  “I’m sorry, Achilles, that was uncalled for. I apologize. My only excuse is that I’m a Berliner. Cruelty just comes naturally to us on account of how we were the last pagans in Europe. So go ahead and tell your story. You were going to tell me a story. That’s why you closed the door, isn’t it?”

  “Yes.” Garlopis gathered himself. “A few years ago—it was the summer of 1954, I think—I accompanied Mr. Neff to the Greek island of Corfu to adjust another shipping claim. Corfu is very popular with Italians due to its proximity to the Italian coast. Italians were part of the Axis forces of course but no one in Greece holds that against them now. Unlike you Germans, they were never very enthusiastic in their occupation of Greece. And of course, ultimately, many of them were also victims of the Nazis. In a way, that’s been to their moral advantage.

  “One evening Mr. Neff and I were sitting outside a café in Corfu Old Town and a man at another table kept staring at Neff. Neff tried to ignore it but after a while the man came over and identified himself as an Italian from a village near Bologna—called Marzabotto, I think it was. He proceeded to accuse Neff of being an SS man who had participated in the massacre of almost two thousand civilians in late 1944. Neff denied it, of course. Said he’d never been in the SS. But the man was adamant it was him and started to tell everyone in the café that there was a Nazi war criminal in our midst. Neff got very flustered and angry and left in a bit of a hurry, with me in pursuit. Later on he said he’d never been in Italy and yet by then I already knew this was a lie. For one thing he spoke a bit of Italian. And for another he had even told me how much he loved Bologna. So I knew what the man in the café said had to be true. Another thing was that Neff only ever investigated insurance claims in Greece and France, never in Italy. And once, when it was really hot and he’d taken his shirt off, I saw that he had the letters AB tattooed on the underside of his left upper arm, near his armpit. Later on I learned from a magazine article that this must be his blood group and that all Waffen-SS men had such a tattoo.” He lit a cigarette and added carefully: “I imagine that this would help to identify Brunner, if ever Leventis manages to catch up with him.”

  “I imagine you’re right.” It was almost an uncomfortable moment although not as uncomfortable as the moment when, with the Red Army just a few days away from Königsberg and a German surrender inevitable, I had burned off my own blood group tattoo. Thinking it best to change the subject now, I said, “That reminds me. I need to speak to Lieutenant Leventis. No offense to your cousin but this afternoon I’m going to move over to the Grande Bretagne Hotel.”

  “None taken. And I have to confess the Mega is not what it was. Even my cousin admits this. Much cheaper of course, but I suppose if MRE is paying then why not stay at the Grande Bretagne? I should have thought of that before. But the fact is, Mr. Neff always preferred the Mega. That’s the main reason why I booked you in there. It was his choice.”

  “Did he say why he liked it?”

  “The Grande Bretagne has just finished adding four floors, of course. So it’s only recently reopened. But according to my cousin, I think Neff had some little fraud going on with the Mega management that enabled him to claim more on expenses than he actually paid. My cousin also had the impression Neff knew some of the other hotel regulars.”

  In view of the revelation about Neff’s Waffen-SS past I wondered if these other acquaintances of his might have included Alois Brunner, but I still saw no good reason to tell Garlopis about meeting Brunner in the Mega bar. It would only have scared him the way it had scared me. I collected my coat and went to the door.

  “Are you going
somewhere?”

  “I thought I’d walk over to the Megaron Pappoudof and tell Leventis in person that I’m moving hotels. Just to make him feel as if I’m taking him seriously. Policemen like that kind of attention to the umlauts.”

  “You are taking him seriously, aren’t you, sir?”

  “Sure. I want to come out of this in one piece. Any talk about firing squads worries me.”

  “I’m delighted to hear it. I’d hate to end up in Haidari among all those awful criminals.”

  “I’ve known a lot of criminals and I can tell you that, with the exception of the ones like Alois Brunner, most are just ordinary people like you and me. They lack imagination, that’s all. Crimes are committed when men take an idea that seems like a good idea and then can’t think of enough good reasons why it might not be a good idea.”

  “All the same, I’d rather avoid the Haidari, if possible. For the sake of my children, you understand. They’re at the Lycée Léonin, one of the best schools in Athens. It takes a dim view of parents who don’t measure up to the rigorous moral standards set by the monks who run the school. That’s the only reason my wife has not yet divorced me. Would you like me to accompany you, sir?”

  “No, I want you to stay here and telephone Dr. Lyacos at the Archaeological Museum in Piraeus and arrange for us to see him again. I need to speak to him about Professor Buchholz. And see if you can find out from that lawyer, Papakyriakopoulos, if Arthur Meissner has agreed to see me yet. I’ll be back in an hour. At least I hope I will.”

  “Well done, sir. We’ll make a Greek out of you yet. Your pronunciation of his very complicated name was faultless.”

  “I’m German, Mr. Garlopis. We have some very complex words of our own to practice on. Some German words take so long to say that they have their own damn timetables.”

  THIRTY

  –

  In his office at the Megaron Pappoudof I told Lieutenant Leventis I was changing hotels.

  “Is that all you came here to tell me, Commissar? That you’re going to the GB? I’m disappointed.”

  “I thought you’d like to know in case you wanted to buy me breakfast one morning. You can probably look out of your office window and see into my bathroom, if it helps make that happen.”

  “Good idea. But are you sure no one is dead in it?”

  “Just my love life, probably. When they find that body you can arrest me all over again.”

  “Why bother? You’re still my number-one suspect in the Witzel case.”

  “Clearly you’re not very good with numbers. You already told me the name of your number-one suspect. At best I’m number three.”

  “Who’s number two?”

  “Garlopis.”

  “That’s not very loyal of you, Commissar.”

  “No, it isn’t. But his home is in Greece. Mine’s in Germany. And I want to get back there one day. Which is why I’m in here writing my room number on your handkerchief in lipstick.”

  “Anything else you want to talk about?”

  “Not a damn thing.”

  “I told you, Commissar. I’m blind here and I want you to be my dog. So bark a little, will you?”

  I lit up a cigarette and blew some smoke at the high ceiling. The fan wasn’t moving, which was how I knew it was still officially winter in Athens. Otherwise it seemed quite warm in his office. Leventis leaned back on his chair, looking at me steadily all the time, waiting for me to say something more, and then nodded when I didn’t. “You keep your mouth shut unless you’ve got something to say. All right. Not many people can do that judiciously. Especially in here. You’ve a talent for saying not very much, Commissar.”

  “I never learned much by listening to myself.”

  “No? Then maybe I can tell you something interesting.”

  “That’ll make a nice change.”

  “Don’t forget your position here, Ganz.” He wagged his finger at me like I was a naughty schoolboy and grinned. “You’re a little impertinent for a suspect.”

  “That’s just my manner. It doesn’t work with everyone. Only with people, not cops. Look, I said I’d cooperate with you, Leventis, not crown you with wild olive. And we both know I’m a poor choice of suspect. On account of how I turned up at the murder scene after the murder. Garlopis, too. It’s time you admitted that, copper, or else you’re dumber than I thought you were.”

  “My name isn’t copper, it’s Stavros P. Leventis. But you can call me lieutenant. And in here I don’t have to admit to a damn thing. I leave that to other people. What’s dumb about that?”

  “Nothing at all. What does the P stand for, anyway?”

  “Patroclus. Only keep that quiet.”

  “I’ll lend it someone else’s armor if it will help get me out of this damn country. Tell me what’s so interesting, Pat.”

  “Last night, the City Police picked up a local burglar by the name of Tsochaztopoulos, only everyone calls him Choc.”

  “Now that I can understand.”

  “He put his hands up to a whole string of burglaries across the city, but here’s where it starts to get interesting.”

  “I was hoping it might.”

  “He claims he was put up to robbing Frizis’s office in Glyfada. Says the job was to take one client file and to cover his tracks so that the lawyer didn’t even know he’d been there. Says he was paid to do it by a man he met in a nightclub. The Chez Lapin in Kastella.”

  “Sounds like a real hole. Did this man have a name?”

  “Just Spiros.”

  “That narrows it down nicely. And what was the client’s name?”

  Leventis grinned patiently. “Spiros told Choc to look for a client file in the name of Fischer. Georg Fischer. He did the job as asked. Went in and out without a trace. Took the client file back to the club a few hours later, and got paid.”

  “So everyone was happy.”

  “Now it just so happens that Frizis’s diary contains an appointment with a Mr. Fischer just a few days before he was murdered.”

  “Well, it would if he was a client.”

  “Fischer is a German name.”

  “That’s right.”

  “I was hoping you might have a theory on that one.”

  “It’s the fourth most common German surname there is. That narrows it down.”

  “Come on, Ganz. You can do better than that. Whose side are you on here?”

  “Whose side? I don’t know the names of the teams that are on the pitch here. And even if I did I certainly couldn’t pronounce them.”

  “You know, I think I must have left my sense of humor in my other uniform.”

  “The clean one?”

  “I’d hate to kick you on the leg, Ganz. I’d probably get gangrene. What kind of commissar were you, anyway?”

  “I wore a shirt and tie, turned up for work every day, carried a warrant disc, and sometimes they let me arrest people. But none of the bosses really gave a shit about me detecting any crimes because they were too busy committing crimes themselves. Nothing serious. Crimes against humanity and that kind of thing. Look, Pat—Lieutenant—I was making a living and trying to stay alive, not preaching the First Crusade. Let me ask you this. Did you show this Choc fellow your photograph of Brunner? The one you showed me?”

  “Yes, but he’s quite sure it wasn’t him who put him up to the job.”

  “Hmm.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Hegel said it once. It’s German for ‘I’m thinking.’”

  After a while I shook my head for emphasis, just to let him know I’d finished the thought.

  “What do you think you’re dealing with here? An insurance claim? Look, I know you know more than you’re saying. I can see it written on your face.”

  “Now you know why I stopped being a criminal and became a cop instead. All
right. Maybe I do know something. But don’t get mad when I tell you. I only just figured this out myself. And I’d feel better about telling you what that is if we walked across the street and you let me buy you a drink.”

  Leventis picked up his cap and walked toward the office door, buttoning his tunic.

  “Two things I can smell from a hundred meters away. My mother’s giouvetsi lamb stew and a lying cop.”

  “I keep telling you. I’m in the insurance business.”

  “It’s my guess your company hired you because you’re an ex-cop and you’ve got a dirty mind. I’m just doing the same as them. Detection is in your blood, Ganz, as if it was a disease.”

  “If you mean it’s one that I can’t seem to shake off, then you’re right. It’s like leprosy. I keep winding bandages around my face but nothing seems to work. One day I’m afraid I’m going to lose my nose.”

  “That’s an occupational hazard for all detectives.”

  His secretary handed him his gloves and a little swagger stick and we went downstairs and outside.

  Behind the long marble bar at the Grande Bretagne was an old tapestry as big as the fire screen on a theater stage, depicting the triumph of some ancient Greek who probably wasn’t Hector on account of the fact that he was riding in a chariot instead of being dragged behind one. It was a nice quiet bar; the prices were fixed to make sure of that, like heavily armed hoplites. Facing the tapestry were eight tall stools and sitting at the bar was like watching a large projection screen with just one stationary, rather dull picture, a bit like Greek television. They had so many bottles behind the bar I guessed they must have some navy-strength gin and since the barman evidently knew the difference between a fresh lime and the liquid green sugar that came in a bottle I ordered a gimlet and the lieutenant ordered iced raki.

  We sipped our drinks politely but I was already ordering another and a packet of butts.

  “All excuses sound better after a drink. So now you’ve had yours, start talking, Commissar.”